Chinese language official sentenced to life in jail for Bitcoin mining, corruption

by Jeremy

A Chinese language authorities official has been sentenced to life in jail for each illegitimate enterprise operations of operating a 2.4 billion Chinese language Yuan ($329 million) Bitcoin mining enterprise and unrelated fees of corruption. 

In keeping with native media experiences, on Aug. 22, the Intermediate Folks’s Courtroom of Hangzhou Metropolis sentenced Xiao Yi, a former member of the Jiangxi Provincial Political Consultative Convention Celebration Group and Vice Chairman, to life in jail for corruption and abuse of energy.

The corruption fees stem from non-crypto-related actions of bribery from 2008 to 2021. The abuse of energy fees, relationship from 2017 to 2021, stem from offering monetary and electrical energy subsidies to Jiumu Group Genesis Expertise, a agency primarily based within the Metropolis of Fuzhou that at one level operated greater than 160,000 Bitcoin (BTC) mining machines.

Prosecutors say that Yi “coated up” the mining operation by instructing related departments to manufacture statistical experiences and alter the classification of electrical energy consumption. From 2017 to 2020, Jiumu’s electrical energy consumption accounted for 10% of Fuzhou’s whole electrical energy consumption. “Yi pleaded responsible and repented, actively returned the stolen funds, and all of the bribes and their income have been seized,” wrote the ruling Justice of the Peace of the Hangzhou Folks’s Courtroom.

At present, China bans all types of cryptocurrency transactions, change operations, and fiat-to-crypto onboarding however has stopped in need of prohibiting outright possession. In an Aug. 3 determination, a Chinese language court docket dominated {that a} $10 million Bitcoin lending contract was invalid primarily based on the nation’s Bitcoin ban with no risk of authorized debt restoration. On Aug. 14, a Chinese language nationwide was sentenced to 9 months in jail for serving to an acquaintance buy Tether (USDT), profiting $20 from the transaction

Former Chinese language authorities official Xiao Yi awaits sentencing. | Supply: Intermediate Folks’s Courtroom of Hangzhou Metropolis

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